"The first victory we can claim is that our hearts are free of hatred. Hence we say to those who persecute us and who try to dominate us: ‘You are my brother. I do not hate you, but you are not going to dominate me by fear. I do not wish to impose my truth, nor do I wish you to impose yours on me. We are going to seek the truth together’. THIS IS THE LIBERATION WHICH WE ARE PROCLAIMING."
Oswaldo José Payá Sardiñas (2002)

Friday, September 2, 2016

Dangerous Spin: AP reporting Cuba official propaganda on Zika as news

Reason for concern: Cuba has a poor record on timely reporting of epidemics due to politicized healthcare claims

Soldier carries fumigating machine into a Havana home (AP/Desmond Boylan)

"Six months after President Raul Castro declared war on the Zika virus in Cuba, a militarized nationwide campaign of intensive mosquito spraying, monitoring and quarantine appears to be working.Cuba
is among the few countries in the Western Hemisphere that have so far
prevented significant spread of the disease blamed for birth defects in
thousands of children. Only three people have caught Zika in Cuba. Thirty have been diagnosed with cases of the virus they got outside the island, according to Cuban officials.
Many are now watching to see whether Cuba is able to maintain control of Zika or will drop its guard and see widening infection like so many of its neighbors.

On August 25, 2016 this blog outlined a number of concerns arising from the reporting on Zika and Cuba and the possible danger it poses to travelers:

Past aggressive responses hyped by the regime such as dengue by 1997 involved the arrest of at least one doctor for enemy propaganda who correctly warned of a Dengue outbreak sentenced him to eight years in prison
then forced him into exile after an international outcry. Eventually
when the bodies started to pile up and it was no longer possible to
cover up the epidemic the regime admitted they had a problem.

In 2012 a cholera outbreak went unreported at first and later was under reported. A Cuban independent journalist who broke the story on cholera spent months arbitrarily detained and was recognized as an Amnesty International prisoners of conscience.

Consider that 3.5 million people visited Cuba in 2015 and tourism to
the island in 2016 so far is 15 percent higher than last year. The crisis in Venezuela is impacting Cuba economically making tourism a priority source of hard income. In the past the regime has demonstrated a resistance to reporting or it has under-reported on the outbreaks of diseases in the island.

However there is also a failure on reporting on how Cubans are being treated versus foreign visitors at healthcare facilities in Cuba. Translating Cuba has a report from Juan Juan Almeida "Zika Reveals the True Character of the Cuban Health Service" on the differing treatment facilities and standards of care that should be newsworthy but goes unmentioned in AP's reporting. Cubans receive far inferior healthcare in their own country compared to treatment meted out to foreigners..